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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26581444">leave a light on for me</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/hyunsparkles/pseuds/hyunsparkles'>hyunsparkles</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Stray Kids (Band)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Felix is called yongbok, Immortality, Jisung is Trying His Best and I love him, Jisung is a time traveler, Kissing, Lee Minho | Lee Know-centric, Light Angst, M/M, Minho is immortal, Minor Hwang Hyunjin/Lee Minho | Lee Know, Time Skips, Time Travel, all the skz members show up eventually, also inspired by age of adaline, author is a Big Romantic and it shows, its a soulmate au if you squint, this started out as a one-shot but then it just... grew</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 12:15:16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>15,298</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26581444</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/hyunsparkles/pseuds/hyunsparkles</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p></p><blockquote>
  <p>Minho’s heart rate accelerates. For a moment, he feels like he’s dreaming. Those high cheekbones, that long nose and curving jaw; those bright, bright eyes. <em>Mansoo,</em> his brain insists for a terrible, wonderful second. <em>Mansoo.</em></p>
  <p>But Mansoo is dead. And this boy is so, so alive.</p>
</blockquote>Time passes slowly for Minho, but every once in a while, Jisung is there.<p>Or: Minho is immortal. Jisung is a time traveler that looks nearly identical to Minho's first love.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Han Jisung | Han/Lee Minho | Lee Know</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>45</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>111</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. prologue: eyes in the dark</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>The title of this work comes from Coldplay's "Midnight."</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>A very long time ago.</strong>
</p>
<p>When Lee Minho is twenty-one years old, his life changes forever.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He stands on the banks of the local pond, the chill winter air bristling through his wool coat. This close to Lunar New Year, the deep blue-brown of the water’s surface is a sheet of ice. The  late afternoon sun trickles down from the clouds, turning the surface of the pond treacherously bright. </p>
<p>Minho glances at his friend, standing with his hands on his hips beside him. Biting his lip, Mansoo stares out at the ice, his gaze focused. Minho has to raise his chin a little to look at him. <em>Stupid giant</em>, he thinks fondly.</p>
<p>A cold gust blows past them, setting Minho’s teeth chattering. Standing still, he can feel the icy burn of the snow melting into his shoes.</p>
<p> “So is it safe or not?” Minho asks, his voice sharp.</p>
<p>Mansoo shoots him a glare, but there’s no heat in it. By now, he’s impervious to Minho’s temper. <em>All bark, no bite,</em> he sometimes says, when a glass of rice wine or two has loosened his tongue, his gaze vague and unfocused with drink. <em> Inside, you’re all soft. </em> </p>
<p>Minho can never quite figure out what to say to that. He never has to. He’s much better at holding his liquor, so by the time he, too, has lost his sense of inhibition, Mansoo is either sick to his stomach or five minutes from passing out. However honest he is with his reply - <em> no, I’m not soft, I’m only like that with you </em>-  Mansoo won’t remember it in the morning.</p>
<p>Now, he glances back at his friend. Mansoo is still staring out at the pond, his brow furrowed. A beam of sunlight dapples his cheeks, highlighting his high cheekbones, the curve of his jaw. Minho feels something tug in his chest. </p>
<p>“Is it safe or not?” Minho repeats. He hears his voice catch, but Mansoo’s gaze doesn’t change. </p>
<p>After a pause, Mansoo shrugs. “What’s life without a little danger?” </p>
<p>One step, two steps, the snow crunching under his feet, and he’s off the bank and onto the ice. It groans beneath his weight. Minho watches as spidery cracks whisper out around Mansoo’s feet. </p>
<p>One moment. Another moment. But it holds. It holds.</p>
<p>Safe.</p>
<p>Mansoo grins. “See.” He walks farther out on the ice, his wool scarf whipping around his face in the wind, the bottoms of his shoes turning dark with the wet. </p>
<p>It looks bitterly cold. But, of course, that’s the point. </p>
<p>They’ve been doing this every year since they were twelve. It’s become a sort of tradition: come out to the local pond once it’s frozen thick enough to hold them. They spend an hour or two walking around on the ice, giddy with the thrill of danger and breathless with cold. Up until last year, they always came with Mansoo’s father, a lifelong ice fisherman. </p>
<p>To Mr. Han, Mansoo’s father, the ice was like a petulant relative, and he predicted its moods better than anyone Minho had ever known or heard of. No one ever fell in on his watch. And if he said not to go out on the ice, no matter how safe you thought it was, you didn’t go. If the ice was his petulant relative, his mother was the winter, and he gave out icy stares that could chill you to your bones.</p>
<p>But now he was gone. Gone with the summer fever. Gone for seven months already, and it feels like forever and no time at all. This year, they shoulder the tradition alone.  </p>
<p>Minho trudges down the bank, all the way to the edge of the snow. The ice is still splintered where Mansoo stepped down. Near the epicenter of the cracks, the ice has given way to black water,  blinking with bright sunlight. </p>
<p>Minho steps out onto the ice. It creaks under his feet, and he feels the familiar vein-pumping rush of adrenaline. He crouches down, touching the sharp edges of the ice with his hand. </p>
<p>Then he feels something, cold and warm all at once against his fingers.</p>
<p>Minho yells. He jumps up, wiping his hands on his jacket. </p>
<p>Mansoo, already two or three meters out, whips his head around.“What is it?” </p>
<p>Minho takes a long breath. Then another. “I thought someone grabbed me,” he mutters. “Never mind.” Probably just seaweed. </p>
<p>He tries to take another step, but his brain isn’t working properly. The rational part of his brain says, <em>seaweed. </em> The irrational part, though, insists, <em> fingers. Fingers grabbing me. </em> Cold as death, brushing his half-frozen hand through the dark.</p>
<p>When he glances up, Mansoo’s looking at him like he’s grown antlers. “You’re scared,” he said, almost incredulously.</p>
<p>“No, I’m not,” Minho snaps. He shakes off the feeling, burying his fingers in the pockets of his wool jacket. The sun begins to warm his hair the moment he steps out of the shadows of the trees and onto the ice.</p>
<p>Mansoo doesn’t reply, perhaps sensing Minho’s bristling. He puts his hands on his hips, though, almost appraising. His mouth is curved up like he’s trying not to smile.</p>
<p>The low echo of a crack, bursting off to the left. It sends a spike of adrenaline through Minho’s veins. He thinks of how disappointed Mr. Han would be of them, walking out across clearly unstable ice.</p>
<p>“Mansoo-” He starts. </p>
<p>“What?” Mansoo replies, low in his throat. In his eyes is a warning. The wind brushes a wisp of partially-undone hair down from his topknot and across the high planes of his cheeks. He doesn’t brush it away. </p>
<p>Minho feels- he doesn’t know. Like he’s blundering backwards. <em>Your father would never let us onto unstable ice,</em> he wants to say. But that sounds too close to <em>you’re not like your father,</em> and Mansoo has heard enough of that within the last seven months to last a lifetime. </p>
<p>He pushes down the worry. “Nothing,” he promises. “Stay right there.”</p>
<p>Mansoo scoffs. “Why?” He has his hands on his hips, his fingertips splayed across the dirty grey of his tunic. The sad, angry look in his eyes fades, replaced with something livelier. </p>
<p>And then he’s running away, and then Minho’s running after him, and he isn’t thinking about the potential consequences of his feet pounding on the ice, not listening to the deep baritone echoes of cracks spidering under his feet. Just this: Anything to keep him from that look. Just this:  <em> No one’s fallen in for years. It’ll be fine. It’ll be fine. </em> </p>
<p>They collide near the middle of the pond. Minho grabs hold of Mansoo’s arm. He was going to push him, fight him, do something, but all of a sudden his brain stops working.</p>
<p>“What?” Mansoo challenges. His eyes are wide. They glint in the dying afternoon light, bright like stars. His arm is warm beneath Minho’s fingers. </p>
<p>“What?” Minho repeats. Something whispers through his heart, a memory. </p>
<p>Mansoo’s gaze flickers again. It’s impossible to tell what he’s thinking. “Minho,” he starts. “I-” </p>
<p>But whatever he meant to say is cut off by a loud cracking sound, echoing like a thunderclap. </p>
<p>Mansoo’s eyes go wide, his gaze over Minho’s shoulder. Warm hands clamp on Minho’s arm, so rough it feels like he’s trying to pull it out of its socket. But there is no time. There is no time. </p>
<p>Minho doesn’t need to turn around to know what’s coming. Mansoo’s deep brown eyes are wide, and for the first time Minho can ever remember, he looks afraid. </p>
<p>Minho barely has time to think. Then the ice disappears from under him, and he’s enveloped in the frigid darkness.</p>
<p>The last thing he will remember about that day for hundreds and hundreds of years is a pair of striking, almond-shaped eyes, eyes that shine through the black water. They shimmer like a memory. There is this, too: a rough voice, he thinks it’s Mansoo, whispering in his head, saying the same two words over and over again: <em> not yet. </em> And then his memory stops for a long, long time.</p>
<p>When he finally emerges from the depths, so much later he barely recognizes it as Korea, he discovers that time has changed for him. While he still breathes and eats and sleeps and bleeds red, he never ages another day.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Actual chapters are going to be a lot longer than this prologue, I promise! :) Updates are going to be sporadic because of college but I have most of chapter 1 written so I'll probably post that later this week</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. the boy</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>It's the 20th century, and Minho, now in northeastern China, meets a strange boy that's been accused of a crime.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>cw: brief implied violence, but no blood.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>October 1929</strong>
</p><p>It’s a cold, dark night in October, the kind of night only autumn seems capable of producing. The trees shiver in the wind, leaves breaking off of branches and tracing across the blackened sky. Clouds, grey and puffy, roll in from the west, bringing with them a promise of rain - tomorrow, maybe, or the day after that. </p><p>Slowly, Minho trudges down the dirt path, his back aching. The path winds out in front of him for another quarter of a mile, his companions’ heavy breaths the only accompaniment to the rustling of the wind between the ricegrass.</p><p>In this part of Liaoning province, it feels like rice is all there is, just endless paddy fields stretching out in all directions. It’s so exposed. Nothing like the village he grew up in, surrounded by deciduous forests that rolled over hills and climbed up the sides of mountains. He still isn’t used to the constant hissing of the wind rippling through the paddies. It’s the worst in the fall - harvest season - when the winter chill starts to set in and the water in the rice paddies turns bone-numbing cold. </p><p>“Are you coming to the bar later?” Yongbok asks. The low bass of his voice breaks through Minho’s thoughts, and he swings an arm around Minho’s shoulders. He’s barely twenty, but has the tired eyes of someone much older. His old cotton shirt smells like sweat and hard work. </p><p>Minho shrugs. “Maybe.” What he really means is no, and Yongbok knows it. He can count the number of times he’s been to the bar on one hand, and he’s been a rice paddy worker here for almost three years. Minho’s found that the more time he spends in public, the sooner people begin to whisper.</p><p>He tries not to make friends. He rebuffed Yongbok for almost a year, but the younger boy’s bright, friendly smile eventually wore away at his resolve. He’s paying for it, though. It was just yesterday that Yongbok mentioned jokingly that he never seemed to age.</p><p>You live as long as Minho, and you start to discover that the average friendship has a best-by date. And nothing seems to curdle it faster than the knowledge that while everyone else will age, Minho will not. And it only gets worse once they start to consider the implications. </p><p>Meanwhile, Yongbok gives him an exasperated look. “Yeah, right.” He pulls his arm away and turns to the man on the other side of him. “What about you?”</p><p>The man shakes his head. “Not tonight.” He, like many of the workers, is wearing an earth-toned cotton shirt, loose trousers, and threadbare sandals. Together, they and the thirteen-some men ahead of them make up the last shift of workers at the Li rice paddies. Minho, Yongbok, and a few others make up the back of the pack, trailing the older men on their way back to the village.</p><p>All of a sudden, the wind picks up, kicking up dust along the path. Yongbok lets out a grunt, and he reaches up to rub at his eyes. Minho shields his eyes from the dust with one hand.</p><p>Something flickers in his gut, there and then gone. His brain hiccups. For a second, he forgets where he is. He feels ice in his heart, the tight feeling in his lungs. But then it disappears, as quick as it started. It’s the second time today.</p><p>Minho swallows. <em>I must be overtired.</em> </p><p>By the time he’s shaken it off, Yongbok is staring at him. Minho notices a smear of dirt on his chin, just above his jaw line. </p><p>“What?” </p><p>The other boy just shakes his head. “Nevermind.”</p><p>Around them, the ricegrass starts to turn to wood-and-tile homes. The breeze sends little clouds of dust rising from the path, dirt mingling with animal hair and debris. Though it’s dark, teenage boys scamper past them, shouting back and forth in Chinese. One shoulder-checks Yongbok in his haste. He doesn’t even turn to apologize. </p><p>Yongbok lets out a heavy breath. The boy is already gone, disappeared around the side of one of the homes, but his gaze lingers. Then he turns to Minho, and the strange expression fades. </p><p>“Maybe I’ll finally convince you to come drink with us,” he says with a smile. </p><p>Minho shrugs. “Maybe,” he repeats, unable to keep a slight smirk from his face. “Don’t hold your breath.”</p><p>Yongbok huffs and looks away. “Whatever.” But he’s smiling a little, too. He can never stay angry for long.</p><p> </p><p>Before long, they approach the tavern. A crowd of men stands in the middle of the road, blocking their path. Mr. Zhang’s sharp voice stands out among them, loud as always. Minho can just see his bald head over the top of the crowd, the inward frown of his eyebrows. His face is shadowed with the dark of the evening. </p><p>“...think you’re something?” Mr. Zhang is saying. His gaze is focused on something in the center of the circle. “Think you’re too good to-” </p><p>A young man’s voice floats above the low murmur of the crowd, too hysterical to understand. Something about the tones, the structure of the words, is strange. If he’s speaking Chinese, it’s not a dialect Minho knows. </p><p>“What’d he say?” He hears one of the rice paddy workers murmur. </p><p>Curious, Minho steps around them and deeper into the crowd. Yongbok’s hand brushes his wrist. He turns. Yongbok’s eyes are wide, the message wide and clear:<em> don’t get closer.</em> So he stops, just two or three people between him and the center of the circle.</p><p>This close to the action, he can just make out what’s happening. Mr. Zhang, the bar owner, stands in the center of the circle. He’s heavyset and thick-necked as always, the light blue dye in his clothes faded in places to a strange ash grey. He stares down at someone below him.</p><p>And sitting below him... Minho’s heart rate accelerates. For a moment, he feels like he’s dreaming. Those high cheekbones, that long nose and curving jaw; those bright, bright eyes. <em>Mansoo, </em>his brain insists for a terrible, wonderful second. <em>Mansoo. </em></p><p>But Mansoo is dead. And this boy is so, so alive.</p><p>His rational brain takes over. He looks at the boy again, or as best he can around the shoulders of his neighbours and past the shadows of the evening. On a second look, the boy’s face is just that little bit too thin, his limbs too gangly. His hair is done strangely, barely brushing the tips of his ears and defying gravity off his forehead, not a hairstyle Mansoo ever did or knew how to do. But they could be brothers. They could be twins.</p><p>Minho’s never seen him before. He would have remembered seeing someone so similar to… to <em>him.</em></p><p> The boy stands on his knees, his eyes wide and frightened. Mr. Zhang’s sons stand on either side of him, pressing heavy hands into his shoulders. Minho doesn’t doubt that if the boy tried to stand up, the much larger men would quickly pull him down again. </p><p>“Who’s that?” Yongbok’s breath tickles Minho’s ear. “I don’t recognize him.” </p><p>“He looks like a beggar,” someone else comments. “What’s wrong with his clothes?”</p><p>Another strange thing about him: his clothes. The boy’s wearing a long-sleeved shirt made out of a thick black fabric, metal weaving up the middle. Despite the dust obscuring them, his pants are strange-looking, too, tight and made of a blue-gray material Minho doesn’t recognize. </p><p>Metal in his clothing? <em>Maybe he’s a runaway noble,</em> Minho briefly considers. The revolution was only eight years ago, after all. He’s about to voice that suggestion to Yongbok when the boy speaks again, and his mind clears completely.</p><p>“I’m sorry,” the boy pleads.  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.” Clear, obvious Korean. He glances back at the crowd, his eyes frantic. His eyes meet Minho’s for a fraction of a second, but don’t hold. It’s like he’s looking right through him. </p><p>When Minho looks over at Yongbok, he’s frowning. Minho thinks he knows why; it’s a small town, miles and miles away from society. The Korean community in their village in Liaoning province is small enough that everyone knows everyone. And besides, new workers usually come over in the summer, before the rice harvesting season starts. Not in October, at the very end. New people don’t just <em>appear.</em></p><p>Meanwhile, Mr. Zhang scoffs, his big, burly arms crossed. “You steal from me, and you can’t even speak Chinese?” </p><p>“I’m sorry,” the boy says again in Korean, his voice growing more and more frantic. He makes eye contact with Mr. Zhang. “I’m sorry.” The Zhang sons’ hands on his shoulders seem to press closer. One Zhang son is stony-faced, the other son looking away uncomfortably. The boy shrinks into himself, his shoulders curling inward. He closes his eyes for a brief second, as if he can will himself to disappear. </p><p>“You must pay,” Mr. Zhang warns. Firelight from nearby homes casts long shadows across his face. “No one steals from me without paying.” He gestures to his sons. In a low voice, he mutters, “Find the money.”</p><p>They converge on him, ruffling through pockets and pulling at the thick fabric of his sweater, so rough they nearly knock him over. It’s over as quickly as it’s begun. Their disappointed faces say it all, what Minho could have predicted from the start: he has no money. How could he? If he’s Korean, he’s no prince here. If anything, he’s a beggar. </p><p>That still doesn’t explain how no one seems to recognize him, though. Even this village has its fair share of beggars, but they’re usually older and speak Chinese. </p><p>“No money,” a son with a face like a rat confirms. That expression… Minho almost shudders. Like joy, but worse- a strange, empty version. </p><p>Yongbok lets out a hiss of a breath beside him. </p><p>“We should leave,” Minho murmurs to him. What he doesn’t say: <em>I don’t want to see what comes next.</em></p><p>Yongbok just shakes his head, the motion almost too small to catch. </p><p>Minho just catches Mr. Zhang telling his sons, his voice low, to go “deal with him somewhere else.” He makes a motion to the crowd, which immediately begins to disperse. </p><p>The Zhang sons pull the boy roughly to his feet. He staggers, his gaze uneasy, and rubs at his wrist with one hand. Minho can’t read his expression. Then they start pulling him towards the bar, each grabbing hold of one arm, and his eyes grow wide with what must only be alarm.</p><p>No one does anything.</p><p>Nearby, he hears a laugh, the sound of a breathy female voice. One of the teenagers from earlier is chatting with his friend just within Minho’s line of sight. The dirt road scuffs under everyone’s feet, kicking up dust. A rock skitters and hits his foot as someone pushes past him and Yongbok.</p><p> Out of the side of his vision, he catches the tail end of the eldest Zhang son’s grey-green tunic as he disappears down an alley. For a moment, weak light from a fire trickles onto the path as a chattering neighbor opens the door to their house. But then it’s gone. Dark again. </p><p>In another minute, the crowd is mostly gone. Some of Minho’s fellow rice paddy workers start to call out goodbyes and head homewards. He echoes their goodbyes. In his head, all he sees is the boy’s face. </p><p>“We should help him.”</p><p>Minho startles. He hadn’t realized Yongbok was still behind him. “What?” He hisses. “Are you crazy? They’ll just turn on us, too!”  But even as he says it, he feels something unpleasant churn in his gut. </p><p>Yongbok’s gaze is sad. He glances to the side, as if to check for people listening, but the few people left on this section of the road are turned away.  “You saw him,” he replies. “Do you really think he can fight back?”</p><p>Minho remembers how thin the boy looked. The look in his eyes, more than fear, something else. Confusion. He remembers what it was like to be in a very similar situation. Young, lost in a strange land, not understanding a word of what was said to him. And this, too: being persecuted for something he himself didn’t understand. </p><p>Then he imagines Yongbok trying to save the boy. Young, optimistic Yongbok, with thin wrists and body. He was more earnest than anything else. The Zhang brothers would see right through him. It would be like last May, when they cornered him in the bar, but so much worse.</p><p>He realizes he’s unconsciously made a decision when he catches Yongbok’s glance in the direction of the alley. What would the Zhang sons do to Yongbok if he failed to convince them? What would they do to the boy?</p><p> Mostly, he’s angry at himself for being afraid. Centuries of practice dealing with bullies and he still can’t steady the rapid beating of his heart, that sharp spike of adrenaline. </p><p>“Look, I’ll deal with it,” Minho says quickly. “Go home, I’ll meet you there.” </p><p>Relief flickers across Yongbok’s face. He visibly hesitates, then touches Minho’s shoulder. “I… thank you.” For a second, it looks like he’s going to say something more, but then he pulls his hand away and turns down the path. “I’ll ask Okja to come visit in the morning,” he calls over his shoulder, referring to the local apothecary’s daughter. “If you don’t… make it back tonight.”<br/>
Minho grimaces. “Thanks.” <em>Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.</em> </p><p> </p><p>Minho finds them in the alley around the bar. It’s dark, dark, and it takes him a moment to locate their huddled figures. He hears muttered voices, the sound of the boy’s heavy breath hissing through the silence. </p><p>One of the Zhang sons sits crouched in front of him, leaning in close. Minho can’t see his expression, but something about the set of his shoulders suggests menace. The other stands a foot or two away, his arms crossed. </p><p>The boy slumps forward, his chin so far forward Minho suspects it would have brushed his chest if not for the hand of his captor keeping it upright. His expression, as far as Minho can tell, is blank. </p><p>“Tell us where you came from,” the crouching son says sharply. He says it like he’s sick of saying it, like he’s asked a dozen times before. “Are you from Fushun? Anshan? You look like you might be a lord’s son. Where did you get those clothes?” </p><p>“Hit him again,” the other one says from behind him, his voice gruff. He’s lankier and shorter than his father, with a jutting chin and a face like a rat. “Anyone with clothes like that has money.” </p><p>Minho’s frozen in place. He wills his feet to move, but they stay glued to the dirt path, just out of the brothers’ sight. The boy’s chin cracks backward with the force of the blow. His eyes flicker, then are blank, blank. </p><p>Minho’s heart pounds in his ears. He doesn’t think the boy’s ever been hit before today. Despite the darkness, the shock, the fear, is plain in his eyes. His eyes are wide.</p><p>But then his eyes spark. The boy pauses, then spits right into the crouching son’s face. His expression is a hurt cousin to anger.</p><p>The son recoils, his hand jumping to his face. “How dare you…” he growls. </p><p>Minho can almost feel the situation escalating. Suddenly, he can move again. His heart is going a million miles an hour. His mouth is so dry he doesn’t know if he can speak, but he steps up to the son that’s still standing. </p><p>“Stop,” Minho says in Chinese. Gratefully, his voice doesn’t shake. </p><p>The son - belatedly, Minho remembers his name, Shutong - frowns. “What?” His confused expression says it all: <em>who the hell are you?</em></p><p>“Stop,” he repeats, mindful of the other brother standing in his peripheral vision. If he wanted to meet Shutong’s eyes, he would have to look up, up. </p><p>“Why should we?” Shutong asks. He curls his lip. “He’s a thief. He’s lucky we don’t demand he cut off his own hand as payment.” </p><p>Minho opens his mouth to reply. Before he can, the other brother cuts in. He towers over the both of them, built from the same thick bones and heavy muscle as his father. “Wait. You’re from the west village, aren’t you?”</p><p>Minho hesitates. He did live in the west village, but…  “I came to apologize for him,” he says carefully. “I will pay double whatever he stole.”</p><p>Shutong stares at him. For a long moment, Minho thinks he’s succeeded. </p><p>Finally, he shrugs. His smile is anything but kind. “Why should we let you do that?” He crosses his arms over his chest, his eyes trained on Minho. </p><p>“I’m sure you have other things you’d rather be doing,” Minho offers. “Like Ms. Huang’s daughter.”</p><p>The other brother chortles, but quiets with a sharp look from Shutong.</p><p>“How did you hear about that?” The thin brother asks. His voice is a snake in the grass. </p><p>“Oh,” Minho says. His heart is pounding, pounding. “Well.”</p><p>There’s an achingly long moment. </p><p>“Fine,” Shutong concedes. “Hand over the coin. What he stole was worth, uh, half a yuan, so two and a half… You know what? Let’s make it three.”</p><p>It’s a ridiculously large amount of money, but Minho’s never been so grateful to pay someone in his life. </p><p> </p><p>The brothers leave almost immediately, the coins clinking between their fingers. Minho watches them as they go, his body still tense in the expectation of a fight. When they disappear around the corner, he turns back to the boy.</p><p>Somehow, he’s managed to pull himself up to a standing position. He leans back against the wall, eyes narrowed. His gaze trains on Minho’s face for a long moment. His shoulders rise and fall, rise and fall, rise and fall. </p><p>Minho begins to feel uncomfortably like he’s being studied. “What did you steal?” He asks, mainly to break the silence. </p><p>The boy’s eyes flicker. “So you’re Korean,” he says evasively. It’s not a question. “I saw you in the crowd. Why didn’t you help me?”</p><p>Part of Minho wants to reply, <em>I just did.</em> But the question makes him a little uncomfortable, mostly because he knows the answer: he weighed helping the boy against doing something obviously memorable, talking to the scariest man in town, and decreasing how long he'd be able to stay. He knows it was selfish, but he can't help thinking of Yongbok and how much he'll miss the other boy's bright smile. “What did you steal?” Minho asks again, in the same neutral tone.</p><p>The boy looks away. His hair is falling in front of his eyes, so he pushes it back with one hand. There’s an ugly bruise forming on his cheek, already turning yellow with inflammation. </p><p>Minho sighs inwardly.<em> So this is how it’s going to be?</em> He tries again. “You must have known the Zhangs would come for you. I’m not sure there’s a worse target.”</p><p>The boy just shrugs. Somehow, it doesn’t carry the nonchalance Minho suspected he wanted it to. He fixes Minho with his neutral gaze. “So are you here to beat me up, too?”</p><p>“If I wanted to, do you think I would be making small talk right now?” </p><p>“Look, what do you want?” The boy asks. He leans more heavily against the wall, pressing his shoulder against the sides. Minho wonders if he can even stand up without assistance. </p><p>“To help you,” Minho replies. “But I guess you don’t need it.” He turns, as if about to leave. He takes one step, then another, the dirt crunching under his sandals. </p><p><em>Come on,</em> he thinks. <em>Take the bait.</em></p><p>“Wait!” The boy calls. His voice cracks. “Please- please help me.”</p><p>Minho turns around, concealing his relief. He briefly meets the boy’s gaze. His eyes are glittering with the bare moonlight. Tears. Minho quickly looks away.</p><p> “You can stay with us,” Minho says. “Me and my friend, I mean. We’re over in the west village.”</p><p>There’s a pause. The boy shifts on his feet, staring at the ground. “Thank you,” he says quietly. He looks abruptly <em>young</em>: not physically - he can’t be much younger than Minho - but emotionally. But then the moment is over, and he goes back to that difficult-to-read stare.</p><p>Minho just nods. “Follow me.” </p><p>They walk for a little while, out of the alley and past the bar, the rows and rows of wooden homes slowly passing by. The moon shines weakly through the thick clouds. The stones skitter under their feet, but otherwise it’s silent.</p><p>Minho glances over at the boy. He’s staring up at the sky, at the moon beaming through the clouds, the stars peeking out here and there. He’s just barely smiling, but the look on his face is unguarded. </p><p>Minho’s heart flutters. <em>Mansoo,</em> he thinks. <em>Sometimes, he looks so much like him.</em></p><p>“Do you have a name?” Minho asks. </p><p>The boy startles. The moment they make eye contact, the tiny smile disappears. “Jisung,” he says after a beat. “Han Jisung.” He opens his mouth again, then closes it, like he decided last-minute not to say something.</p><p>“What?”</p><p>Jisung purses his lips. His eyes shift away. “Um, where am I?”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. under the eye of the moon</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Minho and Jisung trek to the west village, where Jisung discloses some important information.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>CW: a few mentions of dementia.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It takes Minho a second to register the question. He looks at Jisung for a long moment, taking in the strange metal links along his clothing, the incredibly short hair, the trousers made of a strange blue fabric. </p><p>Jisung blinks quickly, then shifts his weight, as if uncomfortable under Minho’s gaze. The moonlight cascades down on the path, just strong enough to make out the touch of red on Jisung’s cheeks. </p><p>Minho blinks. Something about Jisung’s lack of composure makes him pause. “What do you mean?” he asks, suppressing the urge to be flippant. </p><p>The rice fields rustle and whisper around them. Behind them, the east village has all but disappeared. It’s fully dark now, and quiet. They’re the only ones on this last stretch of the path, though if Minho strained his ears he might be able to hear the last group of foreigner workers making their way to the west village ahead of them. </p><p>	Jisung looks at him, then away. He repeats himself: “Where am I?” His voice is harder now, like he can legitimize the question by being as forceful as possible. But his voice doesn’t hide the flicker in his eye. </p><p>For a second, Minho thinks he recognizes the emotion - fear. But it’s gone in a flash, and he thinks he might have imagined it. </p><p>“Near Huishan,” Minho says after a confused beat. When the other boy’s expression doesn’t immediately clear, he clarifies, “Liaoning province.”</p><p>Still, Jisung’s expression doesn’t clear. Which seems impossible, because even if he didn’t know the town, all of the steam ships from Korea should have both the port and the province on the ticket. Even if he’d crossed over the China-Korea border, he must have spoken to other Koreans, Koreans that knew the name of the province, Koreans that knew where they were and where they were headed.</p><p>Minho has a bad feeling. As long as he’s lived, he’s heard of people that can’t keep track of names or places. He’s never seen one this young, though. It must not be that bad yet, since Jisung apparently remembers his own name. </p><p>After a long pause, Minho adds, his voice careful, “Liaoning province is in China.”</p><p>Jisung’s eyes darken. He glances at Minho, then says, very unconvincingly, “Right. Of course. I knew that.” He clears his throat. “And, uh, what year is it again?”  </p><p>Now Minho <em>really</em> has a bad feeling. Without meaning to, he thinks of his grandmother, years and years ago, back when he was young. In the beginning, she would forget to salt the venison, or leave her knitting in odd places. Little things, small enough to label as the eccentricities of old age. But it grew. She started forgetting where she was. She’d get lost in her own village, the village she’d lived in for almost seventy years. They’d find her by the fish seller, or by edge of the forest, wandering and confused. </p><p><em>Home is this way, Grandmother,</em> Minho remembers insisting. <em>The same home you’ve lived in your entire life.</em></p><p>She reached up to touch his face. <em>Right,</em> she replied, her eyes clearing. <em>Of course.</em> </p><p>Minho looks over at the boy. Jisung is looking at him cautiously, like he’s not sure what the answer will be.</p><p><em>He’s so young,</em> Minho thinks, his heart clenching. <em>If I’m right, he’s so young for this.</em> After hundreds of years of life, Minho has plenty of memories he’d rather forget. But he’d never want this. Never this.</p><p>“1929,” he says, careful to keep his voice neutral. </p><p>To his surprise, the boy swears. His eyes cloud over. </p><p>Minho recognizes the emotion at once. Uncomfortably, he looks away. </p><p>They’ve just reached the curve of the road, right as it winds its way into the west village. He can hear soft voices from here, voices in warm, rural Korean. Light from the homes spills across the dust and dirt of the path ahead of them. </p><p>It’s beautiful, in an earthy and homey sort of way. Not the houses themselves, obviously- they’re small and old and breaking, wind whistling through the cracks in the wooden walls. But they go on for a while, curving around each other, leaning against each other for support. Some of the houses, particularly those that Minho knows contain small children, are dark with sleep, but the rest are still lit. And everywhere you go, people are speaking Korean, or Japanese, or maybe even Vietnamese. </p><p>As they walk down the main path, Minho sees one of his coworkers sitting out on his porch, nursing a clay cup of what’s probably alcohol. Peering out from behind the front door is a toddler dressed in dirty cotton, cheeks chubby with youth. She’s babbling something to her father, too low for Minho to hear.</p><p>Minho looks over at Jisung. “It’s not much longer,” he says neutrally, taking Jisung’s silence for worry or disquiet.</p><p>“What?” Jisung glances at him, eyes blank. </p><p>“It’s not much longer until we get to where I stay. It’s a boarding house.” Then, carefully, Minho adds, “Do you know what that is?”</p><p>“Of course I-” Jisung stops. He gives Minho a strange look. “Oh. You think I’m- I’m not- I don’t-” He seems unable to finish. “That’s not-”</p><p>“Right,” Minho says smoothly, cutting him off before he can continue. “Of course you’re not.” He gestures to the left, where a one-story wooden home looms. “Anyway. We’re here.”</p><p> </p><p>Once they get inside, the landlord, Mr. Lim, takes one look at Jisung and quickly shoos them in the back. “Why didn’t you bring him here earlier?” He hisses at Minho, a dirty towel in one hand, a plate in the other. “It’s not good to be around people like him after dark.”</p><p>“People like him?” Minho blinks, surprised that Mr. Lim was able to catch on so quickly. Jisung hadn’t said a word. He glances down the hallway, where Jisung has slipped into the bunk room. It’s possible he could overhear them from there, but unlikely.</p><p>Mr. Lim simply shakes his head. “If he can’t pay, he’ll have to leave.” He pauses. “Actually, tell him he has to pay twice as much. If I’m going to have trouble, it might as well be worthwhile.”</p><p>“How can you say that?” Minho hisses back, shocked. “I don’t think he has much longer before he forgets <em>everything.</em> Someone’s going to have to look after him.” </p><p>The landlord frowns. He shakes his head again, as if dispelling a fly. “Kid, you don’t understand. I don’t want any thieves-”</p><p>Ah. Minho misunderstood him. Mr. Lim took one look at Jisung’s strange clothes and tense expression and came to a very different conclusion. When Minho heard "people like him," he interpreted it as meaning <em>someone that probably has dementia.</em> But Mr. Lim just meant <em>thief.</em> </p><p>Suddenly, there’s a crash from the next room. There’s a horrible, squalling cry, high-pitched like it belongs to a young child. Without another word, Mr. Lim disappears down the hallway, his eyes wide and alarmed.  “Hana?” He calls out, naming his young daughter. “Hana, are you okay?”</p><p>And so Minho’s left alone in the hallway. But not for long. </p><p>“Minho!”</p><p>Minho turns at the sound of Yongbok’s voice. The younger boy peeks his head out of the bunkroom, the door prevented from opening fully by someone’s cot. His hair is falling into his eyes, enough that Minho can’t quite discern his expression.</p><p>Minho walks over, closing the space between them. </p><p>Yongbok leans closer. He’s frowning. He glances behind him, as if checking for someone, then whispers, “What if he has, like… a disease?”</p><p>Minho squints at him. <em>“What?”</em></p><p>“The boy. I-”</p><p>“Jisung,” Minho supplies. At Yongbok’s blank stare, he explains, “That's his name. He told me on the way here.”</p><p>“Oh. Sure, Jisung, then. I tried to talk to him, and-” Yongbok sighs. “Look, I just think there’s something wrong with him. I don’t think he understands what’s happening.”</p><p>Minho bites his lip. <em>Should I tell him what I think is wrong with Jisung? That I think he has dementia or something?</em> He peers around Yongbok, looking for the boy’s heavy sweater and short hair. Just as he opens his mouth, he sees the flash of Jisung’s eyes from the back of the room. He’s staring at them.</p><p>Minho shakes his head. “He’s staying here.” His voice is firm.  </p><p>Yongbok gives him a long look. When they emerge on the other side of the silence, his gaze has morphed, almost appraising. “Well, who’s sharing a bed with him, then?”</p><p>Minho leans back. “Why can’t he take the spare bed?” </p><p>“Shut the damn door,” a man calls from behind Yongbok. Yongbok starts. He murmurs an apology, then gestures for Minho to come inside the bunk room. </p><p>Minho slides between the crack in the doorway, letting the door close with a dull click behind him. Immediately, the smell of sweat and grime grows strong enough to choke on. Yongbok’s crammed next to him, the rough fabric of his shirt brushing against Minho’s arm. There’s barely enough room for them to stand.</p><p>The cots stretch from just a few centimeters from Minho’s legs to the far side of the room. There must be eight or nine in total in a room meant for four at most. Mr. Lim, the landlord, makes up the difference by reducing the size of the cots by half and reducing the amount of floor space to near zero.</p><p>Yongbok steps carefully along the side of the wall. Minho follows suit. Eventually, after a minute or so of tiptoeing around the sleeping men, they make it to the back of the room. </p><p>Yongbok sits down with a tired sigh in the center of his cot. His voice barely a whisper, he says, “Mr. Park’s wife kicked him out for the night, so he’s sleeping in the extra cot. He’ll-” here he gestures to Jisung, who sits in Minho’s cot, staring at the floor - “have to share with you.”</p><p>Jisung looks up, his eyes wide.  “Oh, I’ll sleep on the floor.” There’s a bluish bruise forming at the side of one of his eyes, and another across the bridge of his nose. Both are painful just to look at. Minho can only imagine how they feel.</p><p>Minho gives him a faint smile. “I appreciate it, but what floor?” </p><p>Jisung opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. He looks at a loss for words. He glances at Minho, then just as quickly looks away. “I’ll sleep outside, then,” he finally replies.  </p><p>“Shutong might go looking for you.”</p><p>“Who?”</p><p>“Mr. Zhang’s son. The one that beat you up. And besides, even if he didn’t, you might freeze out there.” Minho pauses. “You’re staying in here. We’re not leaving you to die.”</p><p>To his surprise, Jisung’s eyes turn bright. “Thanks,” he says roughly, turning his head away. His shoulders are still tightly wound, a tendon in his neck standing out strong. He’s smaller than Minho realized, all gangly limbs and long lines. Or maybe that’s just the way he’s sitting, curled up like he can make himself disappear. </p><p>Resemblance to Mansoo or not, and despite his attitude, Jisung is just a boy, probably a little younger than Yongbok, in a country that’s not his own. And Minho knows that feeling, the one Jisung so poorly hid with a twist of his head and a swipe of his hand across his eyes. He knows it better than he knows himself.</p><p>All of a sudden, more than anything, some part of him wants to prove to Jisung that he is not alone. He almost opens his mouth, meaning to explain that he’d been in the same situation once, that he knows that it feels like to be in a strange place with no money to your name. After all - and this part he would never say out loud -  he lives that same experience every few years. </p><p>But then he catches himself. Friendship can be born all too easily. He can’t afford to make leaving this town any harder than it already will be. He can leave one friend, albeit with a heavy heart, but two?</p><p>“I’ll be outside,” Minho mutters to Yongbok. He brushes Jisung’s shoulder as he turns. “And Jisung- you should go to sleep.”</p><p> </p><p>He finds his way to the back of the house, where the sparse trees and dusty earth give way to weeds and in the distance, swishing rice fields. He takes a seat on the low clay wall around the outside of the house. The cold of the night seeps up the wall to his legs.</p><p>A chilled wind rattles the boards of the house behind him, and he shivers. Above him, the moon shines brightly as a coin. </p><p>He’s spent countless hours behind the house, watching the moon rise. Tonight, it’s no different: just him and the wall and the rice fields, the west village murmuring itself to sleep behind him, the lights of the east village dimming in the distance. </p><p>He can’t believe how much Jisung looks like Mansoo. In the clamor of his worries about Jisung’s possible dementia and trying to get home, he’d put it on the metaphorical back burner of his brain. But now, in the quiet of the night, it comes back to center stage.</p><p>His throat feels tight just thinking about it. They have almost the same face. Jisung is just longer - longer in general, lankier, his face more oval. But otherwise, they have the same high cheekbones, the same bright eyes. The same high nose bridge. Similar voices. Assuming Jisung wasn’t lying when he introduced himself, they even have the same family name.</p><p>Minho leans back, letting his head fall back to stare at the stars. At least they look the same as when he was young. Steady as ever, shining like miniature souls. Even when everything else has changed.</p><p>In every new place Minho comes to, he always assumes that it will be the big things that stay with him: the layout of a town, or the way the trees shape a valley. Sometimes that’s true, but more often than not, it’s the little things that stay with him, things like this: the sound of Mr. Lim’s voice, rough and overtired. The dirt floor, rough under his thin shoes. The way tiny wooden splinters protrude at odd angles from the unfinished wooden slats that make up the walls, and the pinpricks of sharp pain that light up across Minho’s fingers as he traces them across the unfinished surface. The scent of sweat and smoke from a wood fire, the heavy soreness of his back after a full day’s work. The murmur of odd, rural Korean, the kind of accent you can only get from years and years in a country that is not your own.</p><p>Sometimes, nostalgia captures him to stillness. It’s always at odd times. Times like this, in between moments. It always reminds him that he can only stay here a few more years at most. And then, like the rest, this town will become a memory, and all he will be able to conjure of it are snatches of images and odd between moments. </p><p>Everything has changed. Except for Mansoo’s face, apparently. That, somehow, has come back to haunt him, even after so long. </p><p>	All of a sudden, someone clears their throat behind him. Minho’s head turns so fast he almost gives himself whiplash. <em>Maybe Shutong has finally come to give Jisung hell,</em> he thinks as he looks over his shoulder, halfway expecting the tall, angry-eyed boy.</p><p>But it’s not Shutong or even Mr. Lim. It’s Jisung, standing awkwardly by the wall, his fingers brushing the clay. “Sorry if I scared you,” he says. “I…” He trails off, looking away. “I just wanted to say thank you. For helping me back there.”</p><p>Minho looks at him for a long moment. Jisung’s coiffed hair is starting to fall into his face. In the moonlight, he can just see the shadow of the two twin bruises, curving along the side of Jisung’s temple and across the bridge of his nose. His eyes are honest. </p><p>“You’re welcome,” Minho says finally. Then, “You couldn’t sleep?”</p><p>Jisung wrinkles his nose. “It smells horrible in there.”</p><p>“It’s just for one night.”</p><p>There’s no mistaking the panic in Jisung’s eyes. “What?” He asks, his voice rising. </p><p>Minho forgot he hadn’t told him. “Mr. Lim wants you out by tomorrow,” he tells Jisung cautiously. “Unless you can pay double the normal rent, of course.” He feels terrible being the bearer of bad news, but he was going to have to tell Jisung eventually.</p><p>Jisung’s eyes are wide, wide. “Why?”</p><p>Rather than answering directly, Minho asks, his voice casual, “What did you steal?”</p><p>Jisung takes a step back, like he’s about to run back to the house. His hands jump into his sweater pockets. His eyes are cold. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”</p><p>“What did you steal?” Minho repeats. This time, he’s unable to keep his voice from hardening. </p><p>Jisung looks down. His mouth is tight, his brows narrowed like he’s upset. </p><p>“Even if you’re running out of time-” -Here, Minho’s unable to keep his voice from catching- “-you’re still an outsider giving us a bad name. Mr. Lim doesn’t want a thief under his roof.” Minho takes a breath. “So, I’ll ask again. What did you steal?”</p><p>Jisung swallows visibly. One hand flits out of his pocket like a bird, then burrows back in again. “Bread,” he says, not meeting Minho’s eyes. “I hadn’t eaten in a while.”</p><p>Minho sits with that for a second. Jisung may be thin and beaten up, but he’s not skeletal. His face lacks the gaunt look of the beggars Minho’s used to seeing. And his clothes look near to new. </p><p>“Is your name really Han Jisung?” Minho asks abruptly. Another cold wind whistles past them, and he shivers under the thin fabric of his shirt.</p><p>Jisung blinks. “I- yeah.”</p><p>He almost doubts Jisung’s answer, but then he meets Jisung’s eyes. Honest. Maybe a little afraid.</p><p>Jisung may be a thief, but he doesn’t strike Minho as a liar. </p><p>“You look about Yongbok’s age,” Minho says. “Nineteen? Eighteen?”</p><p>Jisung looks confused. “Who’s Yongbok?”</p><p>Minho realizes belatedly that they never introduced themselves. “My friend,” he says. “The one I was talking to in the boarding house.” He considers adding his own name and formally introducing himself, but he figures to do so this late would only be awkward. Besides, what does it matter? Jisung will be gone by tomorrow.</p><p>His heart clenches a little at the thought. </p><p>“I’m eighteen,” Jisung says after a pause. His fingers reemerge from in his pockets, and tap once, twice on the low wall. </p><p>“So…” Minho thinks for a second. “You’re ‘11? ‘10?” </p><p>Jisung stares at him.  “I just said I was eighteen.” </p><p>Minho rolls his eyes. “No, I mean, so you were born in 1911?” </p><p>Jisung shakes his head. </p><p>“1910, then. I think that’s the same as Yongbok.” </p><p>Jisung shakes his head again. “No, I… I wasn’t born then, either.” There’s that flicker of emotion in his eyes again. His expression is as wary as Minho’s ever seen it. </p><p>Minho has a weird feeling. “That doesn’t make any sense,” he says slowly. His heart is pounding, pounding. “Are you not eighteen, then?”</p><p>“No, I am eighteen.” Jisung presses his lips together, staring at the ground. Then, as if he can’t help himself, he rushes out, “I’m not supposed to be here.”</p><p>Oh, shit. </p><p>Minho has always been aware of the possibility that there might be others like him. But after hundreds of years of life and no sign of someone else stuck in time, he’d resigned himself to being the only one. Or, at the very least, the only one in the Korean peninsula. </p><p>Minho stands up. He can hear his pulse roaring in his ears. “What do you mean?” </p><p>“You’re going to think I’m crazy,” Jisung whispers. His eyes are wide, wide. The shadows curve around the edge of his jaw, dancing along the edges of his hairline and cascading across the inward plunge of his neck. </p><p><em>Mansoo,</em> Minho’s brain chants.</p><p><em>Shut up,</em> he tells his brain. But it barely quiets.</p><p>He looks more out of time than caught in it, with all of his metal clothing bits and strange trousers and overly direct way of speaking. If it’s true - if he’s like Minho - that it’s like he’s taken his time with him, whereas Minho feels more like he’s been caught in amber. </p><p>“When were you born, Jisung?” He asks quietly. </p><p>Jisung’s voice is hushed. His eyelids flutter. “Seventy years from now,” he replies. When Minho’s gaze flickers to Jisung’s hands, he notices that they’re shaking.</p><p><em>What?</em> </p><p>Minho’s brain is a sea of fuzz. He can’t think. <em>That’s not possible.</em> </p><p>But of course, Minho’s impossible, too. His heart sinks.  He doesn't understand much, but what he <em>does</em> understand is this: <em>Whatever he is, he’s not like me. Not like me at all.</em> </p><p>Suddenly, he’s standing right in front of Jisung. He doesn’t know when he walked over. Just that Jisung is looking up at him with wide, wide eyes, and a memory is tugging at the edge of his brain, a memory he’s tried for a long time to forget.</p><p>It’s not a memory of Mansoo. Not that kind of memory at all. </p><p>A long swath of skin across his shoulder starts to burn.</p><p>“Look at me,” Minho says, his voice hard. “You can’t say that here.”</p><p>Jisung blinks. Whatever he had been expecting, it wasn’t that. He flicks his gaze away.</p><p>“No, look at me,” Minho insists. His pulse pounds like a quick drum. He touches Jisung’s shoulder, mainly to get his attention. “Don’t ever say that again.”</p><p>Jisung’s expression turns grave. “Why?”</p><p>An uncomfortable feeling washes over him, cold as ice. A memory flickers in the back of his brain. “Just don’t say it again,” he repeats. “Or it might just be the last thing you say.”</p><p>“Okay,” Jisung says. “I get it.” His cheeks are red, and it takes Minho a moment to realize that his hand is still on the other boy’s shoulder. They’re close, close enough that Minho can see the moon reflecting back in the dark of his irises. Close enough that Minho can appreciate that they’re nearly the same height, and that the bruise across Jisung’s nose bridge is dappled with purple and blue.</p><p>He draws his hand away, then takes a step back, too quickly to be anything but awkward.</p><p>Jisung pulls his hands back into his pockets. “I should go sleep,” he says. He doesn’t meet Minho’s eyes. He slips past him, the tightly-woven fabric of his sweater brushing past the thin fabric of Minho’s cotton shirt, and disappears into the dark.</p><p> </p><p>Minho doesn’t go back inside for a long time. And when he finally settles in his cot, Jisung’s warm body pressed against him, sleep evades him until the early hours of the morning. He keeps thinking of those words, <em>I’m not supposed to be here.</em> And a hope, fluttering like a bird in his ribcage, cradling his heart. </p><p>When Minho finally wakes, the red light of the sunrise trickling in through the crack in the wall slats, the rest of the men grumbling their way out of bed, Jisung is gone.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>ahhh I'm sorry it's been so long since I've updated this!! I got really busy with life and then I had massive writer's block,,, thanks for bearing with me &lt;33</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. heart of glass</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>It's summer 1939, one of Seoul's hottest summers on record and almost ten years since Liaoning. Minho's starting to feel he's outstayed his welcome when a surprise arrival makes him rethink his own choices.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>July 1939.</strong>
</p><p>“Oh, for… I <em>told</em> you I would bring the books,” Minho calls over his shoulder, his voice barely audible over the clamor of the market. “It’s not my fault you decided to skip.” </p><p>“That’s exactly what you said last time,” Hyunjin shoots back. “I couldn’t risk you forgetting. Again.” His voice rumbles from just behind Minho, all acid and worry. </p><p>Minho shrugs.  “You shouldn’t have asked, then.”  He wriggles between two women waiting in line at a fish seller. He mutters an apology under his breath. As he passes by, he gets heady whiff of raw fish, rank from hours of sitting out in the sun. </p><p>Summer in Korea is always both hot and humid, but this year is worse than usual. Minho can’t seem to go more than ten minutes outside without sweat collecting at his temples. On the worst days, simply being outside feels like breathing water. Despite the heat, though, the city market is full to the brim with patrons. Minho can’t take two steps without running into someone. It smells like sweat and humidity, blackflies flitting eagerly between fruit vendors and the baskets of middle-aged women with tired eyes. </p><p>One lands on Minho’s hand and tries to bite. Just as his hand starts to sting, Minho flicks it away, annoyed. </p><p>The only sign that Hyunjin is still following behind him is the occasional murmured apology as he pushes between people standing around or waiting in line. His silence is weightier than most people’s. While Minho wouldn’t go so far as to call him a chatterbox, words come easily to Hyunjin. </p><p>Most of the time. It’s his silence more than anything he says that convinces Minho that he’s really, truly angry, not just bantering with him because he feels like it. </p><p>Minho glances back.  </p><p>Only very rarely does Minho find Hyunjin difficult to read. This is not one of those times. His expression is colder than cold, -1000 degrees in the heat. </p><p>His gaze flickers at Minho’s attention.  “What is it?” His voice is low, almost a grumble. Dust from the street is flecked across his face. His black teacher's uniform crawls up his neck, the starched collar limping a little in the sun.</p><p>“It’s not my fault you got yelled at,” Minho says finally. </p><p>Hyunjin purses his lips and doesn’t reply. Despite the dirt and sweat, he still has a face like a prince, all high cheekbones and heavy eyebrows. Though he’s barely twenty-two, he has the eyes of someone older, prematurely aged by stress. </p><p>The bag slung over his shoulder is full to the brim with books. If Minho squints, he can just catch the title of one nearly spilling over the edge: <em>Standard Mathematics Tables (Primary School Edition). </em> It’s one of the books Hyunjin left work during his lunch break to go get. He’d been haggling with the seller for weeks, only to find out this morning that the merchant was about to sell them all to a teacher across the city. And with the war, who knew when they’d get another shipment?</p><p><em>Fine,</em> Minho thinks. He makes his way through the crowd, eyes focused on the point on the horizon where the bottleneck opens up to the open street. A woman pushes past them, the kerchief wrapped around her head stained with dust. The dirty cotton of her clothes brushes against Minho’s shoulder. </p><p>Just beyond, he can see the edge of the market, where the wooden stalls give way to the dirt and dust of the road. On both sides of the street, buildings loom, crawling up two or three stories. Signs in a combination of Korean and Japanese suspend precariously over portions of the walk.  </p><p>“Okay, look, it’s just, that’s what you said last time,” Hyunjin says suddenly, his voice following just behind Minho as they continue to push through the crowd. “And look where it got me.”<br/>
Minho doesn’t have to turn around to know Hyunjin’s glaring at him. He can almost feel the cold front from here. “It’s not my fault my boss asked me to take another shift,” he replies, his voice neutral.  </p><p>This morning, Hyunjin asked Minho if he could get them during his break, since Hyunjin wasn’t supposed to leave the grounds during school hours and Minho, in a stroke of luck, had a few hours free. But that wasn’t how it ended up happening.</p><p>Minho’s boss is a man with the face of a rat and the body of a bull mastiff. And even if he wasn’t so physically imposing, Hyunjin knows as well as he does that when the factory bosses suggest you take an extra shift, they aren’t really asking, they’re telling.</p><p>But Hyunjin clearly isn’t thinking about that. “I almost got fired today, Minho!” Hyunjin’s voice cracks. His hand grabs Minho’s shoulder, hot to the touch. “And then where would I be?”<br/>
Hyunjin’s grasp pulls them to a sudden stop near the edge of the crowd, right before the crush of the sea of bodies between crowded stalls streams into the wide main street. Minho can feel the air from here, a breath of fresh air. Still humid, but less closed in. </p><p>Meanwhile, Hyunjin’s chest is rising and falling, rising and falling. People are staring, eyes wide as they flow like dual currents around either side of them, but he doesn’t seem to notice or mind. He’s still holding Minho’s arm.</p><p>Minho pulls his arm away. He tries to ignore the flash of hurt that flickers across Hyunjin’s expression. The words echo in his brain: <em>Where would I be? </em> There’s a beat, a moment where Minho’s not sure if he’s going to reply. </p><p>“On the street,” Hyunjin finishes, when it’s clear Minho won’t do it for him. His voice starts to rise. “And not just me! My mom, my dad, everyone - or almost everyone I care about-” </p><p>“You shouldn’t have gotten the books, then,” Minho cuts him off, his voice quiet. “If you knew what was going to happen.”</p><p>Hyunjin’s expression is conflicted. And there’s that voice, the one Minho’s come to recognize. It reminds him a little of the sparkle and crunch of shattering glass. </p><p>“But-” Hyunjin starts to say. </p><p>“-The kids,” Minho finishes for him. Hyunjin's students. “Yeah, I know.” His heart clenches. Then, still somewhat reluctantly, “I’m sorry. That it turned out the way it did.”</p><p>“Okay.” Hyunjin takes a breath. He glances away. “You go on to the post office. I’m gonna go home. I have shit to grade.” He pushes past Minho and into the main street, his shoulders hunched.</p><p>For a few seconds, Minho just watches him go. For a multitude of reasons, it’s better to give Hyunjin space.</p><p>Even if Hyunjin has the face of a hard-hearted prince, he has a heart of glass, delicate and careful, made to love but all too easily broken. It’s the only reason Minho’s stayed in one place long enough to make a friendship this close. It’s the only reason Minho hasn’t left already, even when the whispers have already started: <em>Do you ever age?</em></p><p>He’s been in Seoul for seven years now. According to what he’s been telling everyone, he’s twenty-four, but he doesn’t look it. He looks the same as the first day he came, begging for reduced-price lodgings from his bewildered landlord. In that time, Hyunjin has grown from the boy next door to a man. But Minho looks - and acts, and talks - the same.<br/>
Even this far into the twentieth century, when witch-hunts are for the most part a thing of the past, people start asking questions when you don’t age. And Minho knows what happens after that.</p><p>He should have left a year ago. He should have left six months ago. Hell, he should have left today. This morning, as he walked to work, he thought about the stares he gets from his landlord, the questions he gets from his neighbors, and the long looks he gets from Hyunjin, the ones he’s started to catch the younger boy giving him with a furrowed brow.</p><p>But he’s so tired. He’s tired of running, even though he knows he has to. And the more time he spends with Hyunjin - annoying, overly dramatic, emotional Hyunjin, who never asks enough questions and gives too much of himself away - the harder it’s getting to leave. Part of it might be because in some ways, Hyunjin reminds him of Yongbok.</p><p>All of a sudden, something flashes at the edge of his vision, almost too quick to catch. A boy’s face, familiar as a dream, disappearing like smoke into the crowd as it parts at the edge of the market. </p><p>His brain flickers through two thoughts in quick succession: first, <em>Mansoo?</em> And then, as his mind processes the oval face, the wide eyes, the sharp cheekbones and gangly limbs: <em>Wait.</em></p><p>Minho turns, but the boy is gone. And Hyunjin is disappearing down the street, his broad shoulders tracing through the crowd. He remembers, but fuzzily, vaguely, in the way of all old memories, a boy with fearful eyes telling him that he wasn’t supposed to be there. For one wild moment, he considers rushing back into the crush of people and chasing a dream, a memory of a memory, more hope than fact after so many years turning over and over in Minho’s brain. </p><p>They met so briefly. But the memory of him has stayed with Minho, for reasons he can only speculate at. Of all the people he met for just a day, Jisung has stayed with him, ruminating in his memories, the longest. </p><p>The moment passes, as quick as it came. He hasn’t seen Jisung since that morning when he vanished without a trace. If he indulged himself in chasing memories, he would be in a very different place than he is now. </p><p><em>Besides,</em> Minho reminds himself, <em>how many years has it been? Nine? Ten? </em></p><p>The sun is low and bright on the horizon, burning through the clouds and peeking out over the roofs of the tallest of the buildings. Minho can only look at the sky for a second before it starts to hurt his eyes. </p><p>He sets off for the post office, his heart heavy.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>The post office is a half a mile away from the market at most, so it doesn’t take Minho long to get there. He shells out a few hard-earned coins to send a letter, halfway crumpled in his pocket, the ink in the recipient’s name bleeding into the paper. Then, on his way home, just as he’s rounding the corner of the block, someone slams into him so hard he almost loses his balance. </p><p>“Oh, sorry,” the young man that hit him says, not sounding all that sorry at all. He’s clearly a native speaker, but his accent is strange, like a regional dialect Minho can’t quite recognize. He’s thin and gangly, about the same height. His head is turned away so Minho can’t quite see his face. Something about his voice is familiar. </p><p>“You should be more careful,” Minho snaps. He readjusts his bag over his shoulder, then looks around in case he dropped his belongings. His crumbling shoes are covered in dust. He almost can’t see the textured brown leather under all the dirt.</p><p>Meanwhile, the young man hisses a breath, the kind for shock rather than Minho. His head whips towards Minho. </p><p>And he has Mansoo’s face. Those high cheekbones, that long nose and curving jaw; those bright, bright eyes. Minho would have recognized them anywhere.</p><p>No, that’s not right. The young man’s face is thinner, more oval. He’s thinner in general, with a very different body type than the boy Minho loved. In fact, he looks very much like someone else.</p><p>“Jisung?” Minho asks incredulously before he can stop himself. <em>Speak of the devil, and he shall appear,</em> he thinks, half in shock. <em>Or, I guess, think of him?</em></p><p>“How do you know my name?” The boy asks warily. His eyes flicker, like a burst of recognition, but his expression doesn’t change. </p><p>“Your name is Jisung?” Minho asks again. His heart is pounding, pounding. He can feel himself starting to sweat, and it’s not just from the awful humidity. Maybe he’s mistaken. Maybe there’s<br/>
more of them, more people with Mansoo’s face, and that boy in Liaoning ten years ago was just losing his mind.</p><p>“Yeah,” the boy says after a pause. “So?” His eyes glint in the dying afternoon light, brown and amber, wide like a cat’s. There’s something a little off about his clothes, though it’s small enough that Minho didn’t notice at first. They look secondhand, the shoulders of his coat several inches too small, his too-long trousers collecting in rolls at the top of his shoes. Perhaps given by an older brother, or a family friend.</p><p>Or stolen.</p><p>He wants to ask. He wants to ask so, so badly. But he can’t quite make himself do it. </p><p>“Never mind,” Minho says, more abruptly than he meant to. “Just watch where you’re going.” He turns to leave. </p><p>“I- wait,” the boy calls, his voice catching. “Were you - have you ever been to Liaoning?”</p><p>If Minho had known how much hinged on this moment, maybe he wouldn’t have answered so readily. Maybe he would have watched his tone, knowing how easily it would give him away. Maybe he would have been a better liar and hidden back into the shadows, the way he’d been doing for hundreds of years.<br/>
Or maybe he wouldn’t have. Maybe he would have jumped right into this moment, listened to the fluttery beating of his heart and known that this, this was the moment that would change everything. </p><p>Maybe, for the first time in a while, he might have told the truth.</p><p>But that isn’t how it happened. What actually happened is a third path, because Minho isn’t thinking any of that. How could he? He may be immortal, but he’s no fortune-teller. He’s just thinking about the cold dinner waiting for him at home, the early wake-up for the factory tomorrow, Hyunjin’s set shoulders retreating down the street.<br/>
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Minho’s voice is acid and heat. He feels the lie in his gut, roiling like a serpent. His hand clenches around the strap of his bag. His knuckles are white.</p><p><em>That voice,</em> Mansoo said once over a drink. <em>It’s trouble. No else does that voice. </em> Belatedly, Minho realizes what he's said, or more accurately, how he's said it. He should have pretended to be confused.</p><p>“Holy shit, it is you,” Jisung whispers. “You’re the guy that saved my life.”</p><p>Minho opens his mouth, meaning to deny it again, then pauses. He’s screwed anyway. He’s made too many mistakes here, allowed himself to get close to someone without meaning to.</p><p>“We can’t talk here,” he says finally, his voice low. “Do you- are you staying somewhere?”</p><p>Jisung doesn’t need to answer. It’s clear in his face, in his ragged, stolen clothing. No, he does not have a place he’s staying.</p><p>Minho takes a slow breath. <em>Well… </em></p><p> </p><p>The path back to his apartment is rife with long workarounds. It takes twice as long as it should, especially since once they enter a certain part of the city, Minho makes a point to retrace his tracks every so often and go a different way than the one he started. You never knew when you were being tailed. It wasn’t paranoia, either, that motivated it. There are plenty of alleyways and side streets that would cut the journey in half at least, but even in the haze of the late afternoon as it bleeds into evening, his neighborhood is never safe. Fate help the newcomer that tries to traverse it at night.</p><p>At first, they make the walk in silence, but it isn’t long before Jisung’s curiosity bubbles over.  “You look the same,” he eventually ventures, somehow managing to sound defensive. His threadbare shoes scuff the dirt road as they walk.</p><p>“Hmm.” Minho doesn’t look at him. </p><p>There’s a long pause. They turn a corner. The scent of ash and chemicals grows stronger the longer they walk, a factory looming further down the block. </p><p>“Did you…” Jisung pauses. “I don’t understand. How are you here?”</p><p>Minho shrugs. His heart is pounding in his chest. “I think the better question is, how are you here?”</p><p>This time, the pause stretches on even longer. It goes on for so long, in fact, that Minho gives up on Jisung ever responding. It goes on for so long that they’re within a few buildings of his apartment building before Jisung’s voice appears again.</p><p>“You’re going to think I’m insane.” His voice is quiet. “And… generally, when I tell people, it doesn’t go over well.”</p><p>Minho stops. “You’ve told other people?” What he really wants to ask is, <em>what have you told other people?</em> He barely remembers what Jisung told him that night in the village. That he was born a very long time from now. But something tells him there’s more to the story than just that. Like, how he's here, for example.</p><p>Jisung glances at him, quick as the glint of a knife. “Yeah. After that, I... Let’s just say people aren’t a huge fan of…” He trails off. “Well.”</p><p>“What?” When Jisung sends him a confused glance, Minho clarifies, “People don’t like what?”</p><p>Jisung’s shoulders tense up as he shoves his hands into his coat pockets. The shoulders of his poorly-fitting coat strain against the threadbare seams. “You know what, forget it.” His voice is tight.</p><p>Over the years, Minho’s gotten good at knowing when not to push something. This is definitely one of those times. Instead of asking directly, he asks, his voice neutral, “So what happened after you left?”</p><p>“I went back home.” His voice is short. <em>End of story,</em> he seems to be saying. <em>Stop asking me things.</em></p><p>What Jisung doesn’t seem to realize, however, is how much information he’s given him. It’s 1939, not the Dark Ages. Minho’s read comics before. He’s even seen some of those stories that are getting popular these days, including that one about the man with the time machine.  </p><p>“To your time,” Minho supplies. His palms are sweaty, and he fights the urge to wipe them on his clothes. Some part of this conversation, despite the fact that he’s never had any conversation like it before, awakens earlier, buried memories. </p><p>Jisung’s eyes are wide. He doesn’t speak. Something flickers across his face. In the background, he can see a dark figure emerge from the front door of his apartment building.</p><p>That expression, halfway between fear and hope, is confirmation enough. Minho’s heart is still pounding, but it’s beginning to calm. “Jisung,” he starts, his voice slow. “Are you a time traveler?”</p><p>And Minho’s heart flutters. Because there they are- Jisung's honest eyes, free of the complicated bath of fear and distrust usually there. </p><p>“Yes,” Jisung whispers, and it's like a confession.</p><p>Minho feels his heart clench. He doesn't know how he feels about this. All of a sudden, suspecting and knowing feel like very different things. Before he can react, though, someone calls his name. </p><p>“Minho!” It’s Hyunjin’s voice, coming from the direction of the apartment building. “What are you doing?” He sounds more confused than anything else. Hyunjin must have caught him at a moment where he wasn't talking, just standing in the street, looking at what Hyunjin would perceive as a random passerby.</p><p>Minho tries to contain his disappointment. <em>Oh, for...</em> So much for finding out more. <em>Jisung will shut down the moment Hyunjin comes within a ten-foot radius</em>.

</p>
<p>Minho glances up. Hyunjin’s walking down the road, his brow furrowed. He’s changed into his non-work clothes, a pair of dirt-brown trousers and a cotton shirt worn thin with years of use. He comes to a stop just in front of Jisung. Hyunjin doesn’t seem to even see him. </p><p>“What are <em>you</em> doing?” Minho repeats back at him. “I thought you’d be having dinner by now.”</p><p>For the first time, Hyunjin actually looks at Jisung. Hyunjin’s taller by at least several inches. The shorter boy’s shoulders are hunched like he can curl up into himself, his eyes watchful like a hawk. </p><p>Hyunjin’s gaze flicks between Jisung and Minho: once, twice. For the first time, Minho can’t tell what he’s thinking. </p><p>When Hyunjin speaks, it’s impossible not to hear the chill, rippling off his voice like wind off a glacier.  “And who’s this?”</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. million miles from home</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Minho, Hyunjin, and Jisung return to Minho's apartment, where Minho has to make an important choice.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>They’ve made their way back to Minho’s apartment. Hyunjin sits across the table, his shoulder drawn up with tension. He’s saying something, his hands gesturing lightly, but Minho’s stopped listening. Over Hyunjin’s shoulder, he can see the edges of Jisung’s form as he leans against the far wall, his foot tapping an unsteady pattern. He refused to sit down when offered a chair. He’s staring at the ground, hands buried in the pockets of his dirty, oversized jacket, neck crunching inward and brushing the high collar. His hair flops messily into his face. </p><p>Jisung's mere existence feels like a memory.</p><p>Just as Jisung starts to turn his head, Minho looks away. Hyunjin catches him at it, and his expression grows - strange. Minho tunes back in just as he finishes a sentence: “..that you came here, anyway?”</p><p>Oops. A question. Minho passes it off with a shrug, too embarrassed to ask Hyunjin to repeat it again. He invited Hyunjin in, although half-heartedly. He should be listening.</p><p>“Just say you weren’t listening,” Hyunjin adds after a pause. “Honestly, Minho.”</p><p>Minho grimaces. “I wasn’t listening.” He hears Jisung suck in a breath, but it might be a laugh.</p><p>Just then, a humid summer draft whistles in through the cracks in the walls. Even the wind is hot and sticky this time of year, heavy like the breath of an overheated dog. The barest edge of the draft whispers across the backs of Minho’s thighs and flutters the fabric of his trousers. His heart is just beating rapidly enough to be uncomfortable. </p><p>“Look, I just don’t understand,” Hyunjin says, with the weight of someone repeating themselves for the umpteenth time. His dark eyes are wide, his fingers tangling and untangling over the table. “I thought everyone you knew was dead." </p><p>Minho’s heart seizes- muscle memory. It takes him a moment to realize what Hyunjin’s talking about. “Right,” he says slowly. “I know. It’s- I guess it’s more complicated than that. Jisung’s an old friend.” The lie fits oddly on his tongue, but he can’t figure out how else to explain why he knew who Jisung was, why he didn’t know Jisung was in the city. He folds his hands across the wooden table, the rough, unpolished surface rubbing against his knuckles as he does. </p><p>“Right,” Hyunjin replies. “I can tell you’re very close.”</p><p><em>I thought everyone you knew was dead.</em> He’s never actually told Hyunjin anything about his past, but his reluctance to respond to even the most basic question about who he is and where he came from seems to have told Hyunjin enough. The thought makes him a little uncomfortable. He’s never thought of himself as easy to read.</p><p>It’s quiet again. Minho can hear someone walking down the hallway outside, the floorboards creaking in protest. There’s the murmur of voices, then the slam of a door further down the hallway. </p><p>He looks over at Jisung, but the boy is still staring at his shoes. He seems almost bored. It isn’t long after Minho’s looked up that Hyunjin follows his gaze, turning his head around as if checking to see what Minho’s looking at. And there, in his eyes- </p><p>Minho has a weird feeling. </p><p>“Is he like Jinyoung?” Hyunjin asks abruptly. He juts his chin towards Jisung. </p><p>Minho squints at him. “Who the fuck is Jinyoung?” </p><p>Pink dusts across Hyunjin’s cheeks, the shadow of a blush. If he’s embarrassed, though, that’s the only sign of it. Otherwise, his expression is stone, with the same cold, bright eyes as before. He doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t say anything. It’s like he’s waiting for Minho to remember.</p><p>Minho scans his brain. <em>Jinyoung, Jinyoung…</em> “Oh.” It takes him a second to realize he’s said this last bit out loud. </p><p>That weird feeling, that inkling of a suspicion, boils over. </p><p>
  <em>Is he like Jinyoung? </em>
</p><p>Nowadays, at twenty-two, Hyunjin is no longer a kid. But that hasn’t changed how Minho sees him. In Minho’s eyes, Hyunjin will always be the boy next door, hair tousled, eyes bright, somehow distant and clingy at once. He will always be the young neighbor, the little brother, just old enough to be a friend. In some ways, Hyunjin reminds him of Yongbok.<br/>
Even when Minho leaves, whether that’s tomorrow or next month, Hyunjin will always be Hyunjin. Nobody else. More Yongbok than Mansoo. In fact, nothing like Mansoo at all.</p><p><em>Is he like Jinyoung,</em> Hyunjin had just asked. </p><p>Fuck.</p><p>“No offense,” Minho starts to say, his voice measured. “But even if he was, it wouldn’t be any of your business.”</p><p>The kettle screams on the stove, high-pitched and wailing. Minho starts to get up, but Hyunjin leaps to his feet before he has the chance. His face is a mask.</p><p>“I’ll get it,” Hyunjin says hurriedly. “Where’s the tea again?”</p><p>“Top drawer on the left.” Minho watches as he retreats into the kitchen, disappearing around the corner. The whistling of the kettle fades. There’s the creak and hiss of wood pulling against
wood, then the dull thump as the drawer closes.</p><p>“Who’s Jinyoung?” Jisung asks curiously. His arms are crossed over his chest. He’s still leaning against the wall, one dirty shoe crossed over the other. If Minho wasn’t paying attention, he might have forgotten that Jisung was there.</p><p>“No one,” Minho and Hyunjin say at the same time. Hyunjin appears from the kitchen, holding the steaming clay cups in his hands. His face is contorted into a frown. </p><p>Jisung raises his eyebrows. He replies, very unconvincingly, “Right.”</p><p> </p><p>If not for the incident, Minho and Hyunjin probably would have never been friends.</p><p>It was a Monday, blurry and cold, just past the last reaches of winter. Sleet-like rain poured down in sheets, rattling the windows and turning the dusty road to mud. Minho was just returning from the factory. He shivered his way down the street, the rain soaking his hair and clothes. His breath floated in front of him in a white cloud. </p><p>In those days, he wasn’t used to the smells of the factory. The heady scent of dyed cloth clung to him well after he clocked out of work, staying in the fibers of his jacket and up his sinuses, giving him pounding headaches. It would be months before he got used to it. </p><p>That day, a nerve was jolting in his eye, the pain radiating out across his eye socket and much of his forehead. His vision swam, but whether it was because of pain or because of the freezing raindrops clinging to his eyelashes, he’ll never know. His back ached. Well, it always ached after work, but that day was particularly bad. He was sore down to the bone.</p><p>All of which was to say, he wasn’t in his right mind. And on top of that, he had only been in Seoul for two weeks. The path to his apartment wasn’t automatic yet. So when he made his way to a doorway sufficiently far down the hallway, it didn’t occur to him in his haze to double check the apartment number.</p><p>If he’d been listening, maybe he might have heard the rustling, the hushed voices. Maybe he would have recognized the moderate baritone of his neighbor’s boy. Maybe he would have realized that it was mixed with another voice, one that he didn’t know.</p><p>He opened the door. Two boys turn their heads at light speed. Two pairs of wide eyes, ruffled collars, pink cheeks. Hyunjin, his voice low and shocked: “You-”</p><p>He closed the door. He could barely think, his head still a shock of pain, frozen water still trickling down his face, his neck, from his wet hair. When he finally got his brain to work, staring down the pockmarked wood of the Hwang’s door, all he thought was: <em>His parents must not be home yet.</em></p><p>Also, he’d completely forgotten that Mrs. Hwang had been complaining all week about needing to fix the lock on her door.</p><p>A few seconds later, Hyunjin opened the door just wide enough to stick his head out. His eyes widened.  “Are you… why are you still here?” There was a strange note to his voice, a lilt somewhere between anxiety and pre-breakdown confusion. </p><p>Minho just stared at him. </p><p>Hyunjin hid his head back behind the door. Minho could still hear him, hissing over his shoulder: “Jinyoung. <em>Jinyoung!</em> Go.”</p><p>A low voice, ragged at the edges. Minho couldn’t quite make out the words.</p><p>Hyunjin’s reply was barely audible, the consonants sibilant, the vowels disappearing. “No, I don’t- Just go…. Yeah, it’s my neighbor, I’ll…” His voice fades, as if he’s walking further into the house. </p><p>A second later, a boy about Hyunjin’s age opened the door. His school uniform was rumpled, his dark eyes hooded. His face was bright red. He didn’t meet Minho’s eyes, slipping past him like a ghost.</p><p>Hyunjin, who appeared in the doorway, watched Jinyoung go, the boy’s shoulders slumped like he could disappear into himself if he tried hard enough. He turned the corner, steady footfalls on the old stairs. </p><p>Finally, Hyunjin glanced at Minho. And there. There was that look, the one like shattered glass across the cabinets, the spark and crackle of it as it falls. Minho had the sudden, strange urge to hug him.</p><p>“I won’t tell anyone,” he said quietly.</p><p>Hyunjin’s face was disbelieving. “Yeah, right.”</p><p>“I won’t,” Minho said again, this time stronger. Then, hardly believing his ears, he found himself saying, “I’m- I’m like you.” 	</p><p>It must have been the pain of that day. The headache altered his filter, kept him from his normal reticence. He regretted it the moment he said it. After all, every choice he makes, everything, has to be preparing him to leave. The less he says, the less people ask questions. The less he says, the easier it becomes to leave.</p><p>Hyunjin’s eyes were still wary, but it didn’t escape Minho’s even headache-hazy notice that the tension rapidly left his frame. “I’m Hyunjin,” he said finally, just as the silent grew oppressive. </p><p>Minho hesitated. He thought, <em>How bad could it be to tell him my name?</em> And so, he replied, his voice still hesitant with surprise: “I’m Minho.”</p><p>Minho never saw Jinyoung around again. Once, a few years ago, Minho asked Hyunjin, half-curious, half-bored, <em>whatever happened to that friend of yours? </em></p><p>Hyunjin just sent him a look. <em>Don’t,</em> he’d said. </p><p>And that was that.</p><p> </p><p>Now, almost seven years later, Hyunjin stares back at Minho from across the table. He takes a long drink from his steaming, two-minutes-since-boiling clay cup of tea. He winces, but doesn’t set the cup down immediately. Minho can almost taste the burn on the top of his mouth, the tang of blood, for him. </p><p>Hyunjin turns his head around, meeting Jisung’s eyes. He gestures to the table, where a third mug, noticeably half-filled, sits waiting for him. “You should sit.”</p><p>Jisung shakes his head. “I’m good,” he says. After a pause, he adds, “Thanks.” Somehow, he makes it sound like the opposite of a pleasantry. It has no substance to it. A ghost like Jisung, halfway between two things. </p><p>Hyunjin’s expression is cold, cold. He glances at Minho, then jerks his head towards Jisung. “So how long is he staying?”</p><p>Minho hadn’t said anything about Jisung staying. In fact, he’d even considered leaving him on the street, although briefly. But he can’t. He can’t. It’s more than a little uncomfortable that Hyunjin reads Minho so accurately, especially now that he’s made a revelation about how Hyunjin feels.</p><p>Minho feels so weak. He’s supposed to keep from making these sorts of connections. Hyunjin’s bad enough, after all, one more connection that he’ll have to tear apart, even though he’s spent the last seven years trying to distance himself from the other boy as much as possible. But Jisung, too? Two - relationships?</p><p>He can’t let it get that far. </p><p>Minho looks down at his tea. The hint of his reflection swims on the surface of the dark liquid, more the suggestion of his features than his face itself. He can feel the dirt of the market still caked on his fingers, his neck, his face. He can smell the factory on himself, even though it's been hours, now, since he left work. </p><p>Outside the window, the wind whistles past, whispering at the cracks in the window panes. It’s so quiet. </p><p>When Minho speaks, his voice is low. “I don’t know, Hyunjin.” And why do you care, he wants to add. Yesterday, he might have. But now, looking back at Hyunjin, the unsteady set of his shoulders, the strange, cold look in the boy’s eye, he can’t quite make himself do it.</p><p>Part of him feels like something must have changed, but he knows that’s a lie. Nothing’s changed at all. Hyunjin’s always looked at him like this. With shattered-glass eyes. It’s just he’s been pretending otherwise. He’s been trying not to think about it.</p><p>Hyunjin opens his mouth like he’s about to say something, but then stops. There’s a frozen look in his eyes. They narrow. “Okay.”</p><p>“Okay?” Minho repeats. </p><p>“Okay,” Hyunjin says again. After a small pause, he adds, very unconvincingly, “I don’t want to impose. I have papers to grade.” He stands up from the table, his lanky body going up, up, up.</p><p>“That’s probably for the best,” Minho says. Then, because he can tell it won’t be enough: “I don’t need you here. You shouldn’t have come.”</p><p>Glass eyes, dark and shocked. Minho can almost see it happening, the high pitched wail of the shatter. He never thought he’d be the reason for it.</p><p>Hyunjin wavers a little, like he’s been grazed by a bullet. His eyes flicker away. “Right,” he says, his voice faraway. “Of course. I’ll see myself out. I’ll… I’ll see you later?”   </p><p>“Right,” Minho echoes. He doesn’t watch Hyunjin go. Instead, he just stares at the table, listening to the heavy footfalls of Hyunjin’s boots make their way to the hallway, the creak of the door as it opens, the slam as it closes. His neck feels hot, and it takes him a moment to realize that it’s not just because he can feel Jisung’s eyes on him.</p><p>“That was shitty,” Jisung says, his voice caustic. He finally pulls back a chair - Hyunjin’s. It’s probably still warm. He sits down with a thump.</p><p>Minho studies the long, grating patterns of the table. He doesn’t look up. “I know.”</p><p>There’s a pause. Then, much more hesitantly, he asks, “Did you know he’s in love with you?” </p><p>Minho sighs. He rubs his face with his hands. When he speaks, his voice is muffled. “Yes.” </p><p>Jisung’s voice is quiet. Minho can’t tell what he’s thinking. “Then you shouldn’t have done that.”</p><p>For some reason, this aggravates him. “I don’t owe him anything.” Minho gets up and starts to clear the table. He takes both Hyunjin’s and his empty mugs, but leaves Jisung’s untouched cup alone. He walks into the kitchen area, letting the cups fall into the sink with a clatter. </p><p>The wall rattles; Hyunjin’s just hit something next door. Minho can’t stop himself from flinching. It’s almost impossible to believe how much worse everything’s become in just the span of one afternoon. </p><p>When he returns to the table, Jisung’s swirling his tea around in his cup with one hand, his expression pensive. He pushes back his hair with the other hand. His eyes focus on the wall.</p><p>He looks up briefly when Minho passes him. “How long have you known him?”</p><p>“Seven years.” Minho’s voice is short, abrupt. <em>Stop asking,</em> he tries to convey. <em>I don’t want to talk about this with you.</em></p><p>It takes him a second to realize what he’s just said. It’s only when Jisung freezes, when he looks up at Minho with uncharacteristically wide eyes, that he makes the connection. Minho’s heart skips. </p><p>“That’s a long time,” Jisung comments. Something in his voice is strange, and part of Minho wonders if he’s talking about how long Minho’s known Hyunjin or something else entirely. For a long moment, Minho thinks he’s going to ask it, that question he’s spent the last hundreds upon hundreds of years dreading: <em>How long have you been alive?</em></p><p>If he was a time traveler like Jisung, staying in one place for seven years would change how he looked. But he looks the same. He knows that. And now Jisung knows that, too.</p><p>He waits, breathless, his heart pounding like a drum in his ears, for Jisung to ask. The other boy stares up at him with those wide, wide eyes. Minho can almost guess what he’s thinking.  There’s an endless moment.</p><p>But, to his surprise, Jisung doesn’t push it. He looks away, his dark eyes unreadable again, his mouth pursed like he’s keeping himself from saying something. His fingers tap against the edge of his clay cup: once, twice, then silent. And within another moment, the conversation peters out to nothing. </p><p> </p><p>That night, under the pale glow of the candlelight at the kitchen table, Jisung’s sleeping form curled up somewhere in the dark lump where the couch should be, Minho writes a letter. </p><p>By now, he’s figured out which details to leave out and which to fabricate. There are certain things he can't let on about - how much he moves around, or the fact that he looks identical to how he used to. But, anyway, after all these years, all his letters probably more or less look the same: the casual greeting, the way the long curves of the Y and the g interfere with the first line. He talks about the factory work, about how happy he was to get a response, about the Seoul heat wave. He asks after the addressee’s pregnant wife, infant son, farm and upcoming harvest, all people and things he's never seen and never will, things confined to the barely safe space of a letter. He mentions Liaoning, then quickly crosses it out. </p><p>He carefully dances around the addressee's questions for him from the last letter. These days, they're often questions about marriage, about friends, about other things he can’t, he shouldn't, have. <em>You know me,</em> he writes, unsmiling, <em>always focused on work. </em></p><p>Once he’s finished the letter, he inscribes the addressee’s name across the envelope: <em>Lee Yongbok, Lee Family Farm, Namwon, Jeolla, Korea.</em></p><p>And then, as is his ritual, he cries.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>The Jinyoung in this chapter is Bae Jinyoung from CIX, not Park Jinyoung from GOT7!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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